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With the innovations in textile coating and impact resilient adhesives I can't see why we shouldn't evolve into retiring the sewing machine. Sails built using adhesives to attach sail panels provide a greater contact surface area between panels directly reducing the load on the stitches. With an appropriate adhesive where the adhesion strength is greater than the fabric itself, one would assume the stitches may not even provide any function at all. It will be interesting to see what the future holds...

Lights:1. It would probably lower costs.2. It could also make kites even lighter.3. It would save time (and having to buy or have access to a sewing machine) for those of us that like building our kites.4. It would provide very clean seams, especially across panels that have the same color. So new visual effects could be achieved.

Shades:1. I like the aesthetic value of sewn seams.2. What about maintenance and repair? Could we substitute a glued or soldered panel?

Of course, given both choices each person could choose the one he or she prefers.Because sewing would not completely disappear (at least not all of a sudden), as a technology and technique I mean.Better to have two options than one, so having the glueing/soldering option would, in fact, only be good.

If sewing does eventually disappear for a cosmetic trend, performance gain or manufacturing technique advancement,like most sports there is always a "thread"(excuse that)or call to the past that keeps certain aspects of the sporting equipment that is used to remain traditional and like most sports even if they did vanish completely ,some one will make a shiny new kite with stitches and suddenly we will all want it,double the price of course and possibly double stitched to make up for those dark years without them?The International Kite Makers Union along with The Association of Kite Flyers Professional (EU) has band the use of stitch free kites anyway!

For over ten years now, sails for high performance sail boats have been molded. I am surprised someone has not tried it for a kite sail.What's next, download a file and print out your next gen super-flier on your home 3d printer?

I would be very surprised if we ever get away from kites that are at least partially sewn. For the most part body seams really don't need to be stitched if they are adhered properly.

Even the most high performance boat sails are still stitched around edge tapes and corner reinforcements. Although molded sails are still an evolving process that does not produce sails that last very long yet, most sail manufacturers are now using laminates that are cross cut and glued together - no stitching in the body seams. This only works with some spinnakers and laminates. A lot of laminates are still stronger if the seams are stitched as well. And these are laminates, not cloths! Cloth loses less strength in stitching and does not form an adhesive bond as well as laminates. The bonding of glues and tapes with Dacron and webbing is still far lower than the mechanical connection of a proper seam.

I have heard some folks claim that taped seams are stronger than a sewn seam - this is true in certain situations. For the most part, kites are built at far too small a scale for the weave of the fabrics we use, so we end up with too high a stitch density. Look at most sails - the three step zz used in them is generally at least 9mm wide and often 12mm, vs ~5mm used on most kites. The looser stitch density with tape is far stronger than a seam that is only taped. For the most part kites are so overbuilt in the body panels that it makes absolutely no difference though

The only real major stress points in kite sails that are anywhere need material limits are the interfaces between dissimilar materials and concentrated loads such as the nose, CT, and tail.Since the materials strong enough to withstand these loads do not bond well with adhesives, it's hard to beat stitching for them.

All that to say that it is totally reasonable to not sew body seams (although from a manufacturing standpoint it is often simpler to do so) but there will probably always be a need for stitching somewhere in most kites. Now if the general construction geometry of sport kites were to radically change, who knows...

Frankly, I like the look of stitched seams. And who are we kidding, half the fun of kiting is the visual bliss. In many of my kites I use a colored stitch that can't be seen when the kite is aloft... but up close, it adds to the artisan aspect of the build.

I don't want my kites to go the way of most modern items that are inexpensive, but don't last very long. It's not had to imagine a design where a broken spar means the whole kite would be tossed for a new one.

Frankly, I like the look of stitched seams. And who are we kidding, half the fun of kiting is the visual bliss. In many of my kites I use a colored stitch that can't be seen when the kite is aloft... but up close, it adds to the artisan aspect of the build.

Oh good one Matey,Ive never taken much notice of the stitching until now,OOOHH_YUMMMYVisual Bliss... mmmm...yes...yes it is and thanks to you ive now finally gotten over being so shallow and only loving my kites for their delicious Glossy Spreaders by focusing on its Artisan aspect of the build...STITCHES

For over ten years now, sails for high performance sail boats have been molded. I am surprised someone has not tried it for a kite sail.What's next, download a file and print out your next gen super-flier on your home 3d printer?

I'm experimenting with that:

The sail is made form 2 layers of 11g cuben fibre, the faint spider web like black lines in the sail are carbon rowings.For now that was just an experiment in how long w sail of that makeup would last. It definitely needs a different technique then full area spray on glue But in principle it works very well.The problem is the cost associated with actually bonding the two layers together in a way that lasts.

The looser stitch density with tape is far stronger than a seam that is only taped.

2 pieces of fabric properly taped (3M), with no stitching; the fabric fails before the tape. I destroyed a few test pieces trying to get them to shear, peel etc.

I always sewed over the tape on kites but only because I still didn't trust the tape

Quote

The only real major stress points in kite sails that are anywhere need material limits are the interfaces between dissimilar materials and concentrated loads such as the nose, CT, and tail.Since the materials strong enough to withstand these loads do not bond well with adhesives, it's hard to beat stitching for them.

That ^ I never had much success with tape on dacron, noseweb etc. they eventually peeled so I always preferred to just tack with a water soluble glue stick and sew, its a lot easier to work with around a nose than a grabby tape like 3M

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